Exiles: Far Colony is the next big RPG from Crescent Moon. Most of their RPGs so far have been rooted in fantasy worlds full of swords and spells. Think Aralon and Ravensword. Exiles is different. Inspired by Star Wars, Bladerunner, and Dead Space, Exiles puts players in control of a hero on a faraway desert planet. Your job, naturally, is to save humankind.

The game won’t come out until later this year, but what we’ve seen so far looks good. Exiles is based on the Ravensword: Shadowlands engine, so it looks fantastic, but they’ve made several improvements on it. The whole world is open now, so there are no loading screens as you make your way from area to area. The game will still include fast travel, but the world is no longer segmented into separate areas.

According to the game’s story, planet Earth has run out of resources, and humanity has moved to a colony on a nearby planet. Your character is sent out into the desert for missions, where you’ll encounter hostile aliens and law-breaking bandits. The fighting is gun-based in Exile, so the action feels a lot like Mass Effect or Dead Space.

In the part we played, we rode a Return of the Jedi-inspired speeder bike through a rocky desert. Suddenly a giant bug creature (straight out of Starship Troopers) lurched out of the sand in front of us, and started attacking. After dispatching that bug and a few of his smaller friends, we went into an interior environment and walked down long corridors, firing weapons at arachnid-like enemies and admiring the dynamic lighting effects.

What we’ve played so far looks impressive, but a lot remains to be seen, like how the quests play out and what the overarching story is. We’ll keep you posted as we hear more about Exiles: Far Colony later this year.

At GDC last week, we had a chance to go hands-on with the first free Tetris game for iOS, Tetris Blitz. Similar to other Blitz games like Bejeweled Blitz and Solitaire Blitz, Tetris Blitz will let you play for a limited amount of time in order to reach a high score that you can brag about on Facebook.

The developers of Trolls vs. Vikings don’t make any excuses about the game’s resemblance to Plants vs. Zombies. They look at PopCap’s modern classic as the start of a new sub-genre of tower defense games. To them, Trolls vs. Vikings simply fits in that genre. We’ll have to wait until it comes out to judge, but our main concern is whether or not Trolls vs. Vikings adds enough of its own to make it worth playing. (more…)

Ultima Forever: Quest for the Avatar takes place 21 years after the events of Ultima IV. Thankfully (for younger gamers, anyway), you don’t need to be familiar the 1985 classic to be sucked into the world of Britainnia in the upcoming iOS game. (more…)

We’ve already previewed Exiles: Far Colony and Siegecraft TD, but Crescent Moon/Forest Moon also showed us a number of other games they’re publishing in the coming months. Read on for the goods. (more…)

The original Mos Speedrun was one of those nearly perfect games that absolutely nailed exactly what it was going for: creating a super tight platformer that was designed for speedruns. The sequel is coming soon, and this new trailer shows what to expect.